Drained champagne bottles mark the first week of September as 23 new specialty channel licensees nurse celebration aftermaths and begin the practical processes of getting the services – guaranteed to sink a minimum of $17 million into Canadian programming over the next two years – off the ground.

It’s a fine hodgepodge of channels licensed, with the commission evidently taking consumer interest, Canadian content commitments, and the inevitably expanding Eligible Services List into account in choosing 19 new English-language and four new French-track services.

Baton Broadcasting and the CTV Network were big winners in the mix, with The Comedy Network, Outdoor Life, Talk TV set for Baton, and N1, S3 and Sports/Specials ppv for ctv. But chum is most over the moon with greenlights for Canadian Learning Television, Space: The Imagination Station, Star-tv, Pulse 24, an Ontario regional news service, and the English and French versions of MuchMoreMusic.

It’s difficult to pinpoint which makes the chum powers most pleased, says Mark Lewis, director of business affairs for CHUMCity and pointman on the applications.

‘We love all of our children, but the Learning guys are really happy.

‘Really, it’s a great day for everybody licensed. With the number they gave out, they gave us what we were asking for: the opening to go for it and create programming. We’re completely, totally happy.’

Euphoria is equally evident at Baton. Cashing in on all of its applications, its Comedy Network cornered one of the prime four analog parking spots in the commission’s chosen licence scenario, an adaptation of chum’s license-everybody-and-let-them-negotiate-for-carriage philosophy.

‘They put the locomotives on analog,’ says Ivan Fecan, coo for Baton. ‘With three out of three applications, we’re thrilled.’

The remaining 13 English-language services, no less tickled than the rest in spite of the packaging and distribution conundrum at hand, are Alliance Communications’ History and Entertainment Network; the Family Channel/ytv/Cinar/Nelvana-owned teletoon; Life Network’s HGTV-Home and Garden Television; ytv’s preschoolers’ channel TreeHouse tv; CanWest Global Communications’ Prime tv; Report on Business Television, owned by The Globe and Mail; WIC Western International Communications and Cancon; Sportscope Plus, principled by Clairvest Group and Western Co-Axial cable; and two ethnic services, South Asian Television (satv) and Odyssey Greek-language television.

On the French side, the crtc blessed a French-language version of teletoon, Radiomutuel’s La Canal Vie, the Radiomutuel/chum channel Musimax and Tele-Metropole’s La Canal Nouvelles, to be carried on basic or extended basic.

The decision held its predictable brand of surprises, among them that Netstar Communications came up zero with neither The History Channel nor TSN Plus on the list. Eyebrows were also raised at two dissensions – a rare happening – filed by commissioners Andree Wylie and Gail Scott, which together point to potential problems on the horizon over the next few months.

Scott’s dissension, limited to ytv’s licence for TreeHouse, took issue with the potential preferential treatment problems inherent in Shaw Communications, the second largest Canadian cableco, having 100% ownership of two services, ytv and TreeHouse, and a 26% stake in teletoon.

Wylie’s dissension took a larger scope, adamantly disagreeing with giving the cable companies licence to pick and choose from the second batch of 13 services and taking the licence away in 1999 from any service not in play at that point.

‘I am concerned that the general goal of the Commission’s Access Rules and of its Convergence Report to ensure, in a transparent manner, non-preferential treatment for all licensed services will not be metin a world of capacity constraints,’ says Wylie’s filing, which also points to the riddle of a co-ordinated marketing effort when services are added piecemeal over three years.

‘It will be difficult to include many of the 13 services in a co-ordinated launch. The success of those unable to negotiate early access may be jeopardized on this ground alone.’

With only a day to absorb the decision, broadcasters are saying little on tackling the packaging and distribution nightmare at hand. Instead, they’re buoyed by the commission’s call for amendments to the Eligible Services List, which says no new American services will be added that compete with Canadian licensees, including the services greenlit this week.

‘It slams the door on u.s. importation until we can get these ones up,’ says chum’s Lewis, with Fecan adding that it’s in the cablecos’ interest to get as many of the services up as fast as they can, ‘because, as I understand it, there won’t be other American channels on until they do.’

Deadline for additions to the list is Nov. 4.

In the meantime, everybody’s off. At teletoon, Nelvana and Cinar have announced they’ll be exercising their 20% option and appointing John Riley president of the service.

By licensing those services with high consumer appeal and a substantial commitment to Canadian production, the commission has struck the balance between both its priorities this time out, says cftpa president Elizabeth McDonald.

‘It’s a pro-Canada decision which gives the cable industry a bit of a leg up on digital. There are detailed safeguard protections in the licences which we’re happy about, and although there is concern about the size of the licence fees coming from the specialties generally, the companies involved this time out may be more in tune with what’s realistic.’

The production community will arguably see licence fees first from the four analog-bound services, which are made up of The Comedy Network, teletoon, N1 and h&e.

The three non-news services combined will spend $16.9 million on Canadian programming in their second broadcast year. N1, 100% Canadian-produced news, has committed $4.7 million over the licence term to the independent sector. Of particular note for drama, documentary and animation producers are teletoon and h&e, while The Comedy Network is committed to spending $39 million on original programming over its first licence term.

h&e, broadcasting documentaries, movies, miniseries and other programs on current and historical events, has committed to 180 hours of independently produced programming, 215 hours by the end of the licence term. teletoon is in for 78 half-hours of new Canadian animation per year, for a total of 546 half-hours over the seven-year term.